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We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

newscientist.com

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Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#71

Post by standardUser »

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #41

I wish this article were more specific on what "housing first" means. My understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) is that homeless shelters across the country have empty beds, and that these are not considered housing. When the article describes an alternative of providing the homeless "housing," what does this housing look like? What aspects of housing are provided that are not generally provided at homeless shelters…

Shelters are not homes and are no intended to be. They are a bed to sleep in if you don't have one that night and can comply with all of their many, many rules.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#72

Post by Schroedingersat »

sys32768 wrote: post #2

I tried to help a homeless friend who was an alcoholic, but landlords really don't tolerate urinating on the floor, breaking keys off in locks, and not paying bills.

Huh, almost as if the solution is collective rather than hyper-individualist action, and it requires the resources of a community to pay the upfront costs in order to see the long term payoff.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#73

Post by LarryMullins »

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote: post #42
LarryMullins wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I guarantee I could produce a program that would be acceptable to conservatives and provide free housing. That's trivial; prison. (Ignoring the part where prisons now charge prisoners rent...) Finding a solution everybody can agree on is much harder than finding a solution only one side or the other can agree with.

> That's trivial; prison. This comment proves you don't know your adversary, which is a dangerous situation to be in.

Are you saying that jailing the homeless wouldn't be popular with conservatives? I'm quite sure it actually is (although they prefer running them out of town because that's even cheaper.)

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#74

Post by 1024core »

The problem is: the "science" is used only as a tool to buttress one's pre-defined notions.

Here in San Francisco, near the beginning of COVID, we put our homeless in hotel rooms. One resident per room, no shared bathrooms, etc. Plus, we gave them free food, free alcohol and free drugs (weed, IIRC). The idea was to satisfy all of their needs and not have them going outside. This lasted close to 2 years.

This was a fairly big sample: close to 3700 people. That is a statistically significant sample, given that SF's total homeless population is around 20K - 30K (including those in shelters).

So what happened with these people? How many of them cleaned up their acts and became productive members of society? This would be a fairly straightforward question to answer, right?

BUT! The Homeless Industry in SF has refused to do so! There were no studies done on this population and their outcomes. Whatever happened to these scientists? Why did they ignore this golden opportunity to study this situation? What we _do_ know is that the residents trashed the hotels and the City of SF is being sued by these hotels to the tune of 10s of millions of dollars.

I remember when all flights were grounded after 9/11, and scientists took the opportunity to study the impact of contrails on the night sky, visibility of celestial bodies, etc. Weirdly, no scientist considered it worthwhile to study these homeless people in their new housing.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#75

Post by tst01234 »

frosted-flakes wrote: post #39
not_the_fda wrote: post #26

Progressive cities have tried housing first solutions, yet they have a bigger homelessness problem and it keeps getting worse. Cities that have done treatment first policies have seen a reduction homelessness. A great book on this topic is San Fran-sicko. https://www.amazon.com/San-Fransicko-Progressives-Ruin-Citie...

Probably because people are free to migrate anywhere within a country's borders, so cities with lots of social services get overrun with a disproportionate amount of people wanting to use them. These sorts of policies need to be implemented at a nation-wide level for them to be truly effective.

If you implement them nation-wide the only result would be people coming from abroad to enjoy housing-first social services. Unless you are saying the first step towards solving homelessness is the prevention of illegal entry and the mass expulsion of illegal immigrants.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#76

Post by millimeterman »

enkid wrote: post #48
millimeterman wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Directly? No. But indirectly? Yes. The rampancy of NIMBY, PHIMBY, and "anti-gentrification" attitudes leads to decreased construction, increased housing prices, and the enrichment of (existing) landlords at the expense of tenants.

How is this a "left" only thing?

It's not, but I didn't say it was. Plus the reasons that "the left" opposes housing are generally quite different than the reasons "the right" opposes housing.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#77

Post by dragonwriter »

LarryMullins wrote: post #67
Ancalagon wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't these permanent "homeless camps" already exist though? When I was in Portland last January I saw a large grouping of what I can only describe as very-tiny homes - essentially glorified shacks on rollers and stilts - which were obviously city-sanctioned homeless encampments next to a bypass.

The camps that last the longest seem to be the ones furthest from neighborhoods where rich people might complain about it. Near or under highways is a "good" place for the camps since highways are noisy/stinky and properties next to highways generally aren't very desirable. Homeless camps in nicer neighborhoods might last for a few weeks/months but seem a lot less permanent than those under highways.

> Near or under highways is a “good” place for the camps since highways are noisy/stinky and properties next to highways generally aren’t very desirable.

Under highways, particularly, also have the political advantage of reduced visibility.

As a bonus (for the people who don’t want the homeless around), these locations (near and under highways) are also extremely unhealthy, particularly for people with respiratory conditions (and staying in them is a good way to develop such conditions in the first place), so it helps reduce the population served.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#78

Post by luckylion »

jasmer wrote: post #55
ErikVandeWater wrote: post #41

I wish this article were more specific on what "housing first" means. My understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) is that homeless shelters across the country have empty beds, and that these are not considered housing. When the article describes an alternative of providing the homeless "housing," what does this housing look like? What aspects of housing are provided that are not generally provided at homeless shelters…

Basically something that resembles a home aka apartment. 'Shelters' are not close to that. They are places to 'kind of sleep' and that's usually it. It's not a 'home' if you have to share a room with 40 other smelly people and you have to be out by morning. There is a lot of theft, violence, many homeless find it much more peacable to sleep rough than in a shelter. Many people are so messed up and many incorrigably i…

> But 'housing first' is an important insight to consider because when you think about it it makes sense.

And it's a good goal, too. I mean, to achieve that, you'd have to aggressively build apartments, because it's not like we have 50% of flats being empty and people ending up on the street because nobody will take the government's money and rent out apartments. Once you do that appropriately, some of the pressure will be lowered. You'll still end up with some people landing on the streets, but you'll have fewer, because rents are more affordable and especially smaller apartments are being built. Fewer people, smaller problem.

Unfortunately, that might also be why we're not doing it everywhere. For all I can tell, most local governments don't want new housing.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#79

Post by LarryMullins »

frosted-flakes wrote: post #39
not_the_fda wrote: post #26

Progressive cities have tried housing first solutions, yet they have a bigger homelessness problem and it keeps getting worse. Cities that have done treatment first policies have seen a reduction homelessness. A great book on this topic is San Fran-sicko. https://www.amazon.com/San-Fransicko-Progressives-Ruin-Citie...

Probably because people are free to migrate anywhere within a country's borders, so cities with lots of social services get overrun with a disproportionate amount of people wanting to use them. These sorts of policies need to be implemented at a nation-wide level for them to be truly effective.

"Thing that fails in the small scale needs to be implemented on an even bigger scale" is a hard sell. How do you convince a state that thinks California is a hell hole that they should implement Californian policies in their own state? This doesn't seem possible to me.

If there can be a politically practical solution at all, I think it must be one that can be demonstrated to work in the small scale.

Re: We can reduce homelessness if we follow the science on what works

#80

Post by gsk22 »

tst01234 wrote: post #75
frosted-flakes wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because people are free to migrate anywhere within a country's borders, so cities with lots of social services get overrun with a disproportionate amount of people wanting to use them. These sorts of policies need to be implemented at a nation-wide level for them to be truly effective.

If you implement them nation-wide the only result would be people coming from abroad to enjoy housing-first social services. Unless you are saying the first step towards solving homelessness is the prevention of illegal entry and the mass expulsion of illegal immigrants.

It is orders of magnitude harder to cross the US national border than between states or counties.

Either way, I don't understand this idea that we shouldn't care for Americans because what if some non-Americans got in?

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